All That Jazz

20 February 2020

Something curious happened in the western world about a hundred years ago. After the end of the First World War and the Spanish Flu epidemic which followed, society seemed to hold its breath – but then, at the start of the Twenties, the young generation – men and women, mostly in their twenties and thirties, went crazy.

The Jazz Age arrived and it wasn’t just new music; there was a revolution in everything from clothes to art, and architecture to hair styles. Most of these people had served in the war or been in associated occupations, and hardly any had not been close to tragedy. Now it was time for everything to change.

The powers-that-be – what became known in the Sixties as ‘the establishment’ – were horrified. In terms of youthful rebellion comparisons can be made with the Sixties, but if anything the young people of the Twenties took things further and faster than their grandchildren ever did.

The authorities reacted with something of a moral panic, and one thing that they did quite urgently was outlaw narcotics.

Cocaine was made illegal in a hurry in 1920, and cannabis eight years later. It was then more than thirty years before scientists realised that the narcotic element of cannabis was the compound THC, and that another component, cannabidiol – CBD – was very different, and had health-giving and therapeutic properties.

It’s only in very recent times – since late 2018 in Britain – that CBD has been legalised, and it is now widely available and highly popular. Today the loveliest way to take CBD is with yummy Haughton Honey, and maybe it was worth the wait.